Ferros

Zerstorung

Zerstorung, sometimes called Brechennact or the God-storm, is the night when the Wyrd attacked Ferros and destroyed the temples. It happened mid-fall, on 10-11-3271. Since then, the world has been very different, thus a name was given to mark this day. It is unknown exactly how the Wyrd views this term as it mostly arose from the people and has been spread by bards.

Brechennact began with the sky shifting and smearing. The stars began to move, weaving trails and smearing to make great nebulae and sigils. As they did, reality began to crack as the planes were forced into each other in unnatural ways. These cracks appeared as rends in the air, areas of static and blur that break down anything that enters them. Some wizards have thought that these rends could be used for transport to other planes, but no serious efforts have been made. After the rends appeared, the sky began to glow across the planet in an unearthly aurora. In major cities, witnesses report that gates opened above the temples. The Wyrd emerged and laid waste to the temples with frightening speed. The clerics and paladins were killed and the temples broken. And worse, with the blood of those killed on the once-holy altars, the Wyrd unleashed a horrible ritual, sundering all the smaller temples to that god across the land. Any who tried to stop the destruction were killed without thought or mercy. Even places such as Prime Meridian Travels and the town of Chitin were similarly destroyed, despite no obvious connection to the divine.

Since then, the Wyrd proclaimed themselves masters of the world and set about retrieving declarations of surrender and fealty from the various nations. This inevitably involved various military campaigns. In most cases the Wyrd conquered the nations easily (the Esterlands, for example, surrendered without a fight). Jeberra, Ominia, and Kal’renth were the only ones to cause the Wyrd any significant trouble. The armies of Mohorin lived up to their reputation and held back the Wyrd for several days. But with each day more and more of the people were turned to antitheses until finally the Wyrd unleashed a ritual that broke the army. Ominia quickly pulled back most of its forces to protect the heavily populated eastern front of the empire. Most civilians were evacuated off-plane while the church and military defended the Silver City. Over the months, Ur-Lord Vespa led a campaign across the continent, taking more and more land. Reports say that she is marching on the Silver City soon.

As for Kal’renth, the draconic temples were struck by the Wyrd just as the mortal temples were, but they suffered the least damage. The dragons were quick to respond and their raw fury kept the Wyrd at bay. In Jik’ton the people say that the sky itself turned to dragon’s breath and the oldest dragons, the high priests and council members flew out to meet Exarch Lachesis and drove him out. Since then the council has militarized the continent with frightening speed. All dragons and their kin have been drafted into the protection of the continent. Any mortals who have useful skills have been kept around to service the great army, others have been put to work in mines or fields or logistics, else they were promptly evicted. A notable exception to that has been the Resistance of Manny. Wilhelm and Smaragd negotiated a deal with the council to allow the Resistance to operate out of Jik’ton. In return, they are to assist in the defense of the city and have been set with the task of gathering various magical items and artifacts from around the world. Ur-Lord Iusti has been their main foe but reports say that Ur-Lord Severus is making a powerful and unique spell to kill the dragons. So far it is a stalemate but the people grow uneasy.

Over the course of the year since, the Wyrd have banished the teachings of any god other than Lachesis. Every town and church has had their own resistance movement, but the most successful has been Manny’s. When the Wyrd introduced their Fatespinners, the Church of Manny responded with Holy Liberators. What started out as a covert group of clerics meeting in basements and alleys soon became guerilla rebels and even, in some towns, open rebellion against the Wyrd. The Wyrd began to lose ground most notably in Manscell and then in Ominia. They attempted to take back territory themselves, but every time they found that the Church of Manny had its own high-level champions ready to respond. The Champions of Freedom weren’t enough to kill any of the Wyrd themselves, but they could repel an offensive much more easily and hold territory of their own. By the 9th month since Zerstorung, both forces had assembled small armies and militias. There were no particular groups who found themselves drawn to one side or another—each had elves and halflings, each had necromancers and paladins. Governments were split, some wanting to regain independence and some wanting the security and power of the Fatespinners. The majority of the dragons supported Manny, but a small faction of chromatics abandoned Kal’renth to wreak havoc for Lachesis.

The conflict came to an abrubt halt when, on 9-25-3272, the skies trembled with the arrival of the angels and announcement that Lachesis had been defeated. Across the world the Holy Liberators and other sympathizers of Manny drove out the Fatespinners and the antitheses. With the deaths of the Wyrd, most of the antitheses began to go berserk and fled the cities. They infested the countryside and the caves beneath. In the days following, Holy Liberators would rally the townsfolk to hunt down the antitheses. No way to restore an antithesis had been found, and many within the churches hotly debated whether it was worth any effort to find one or not. Each country declared its own holiday, but the most popular term for it has been Liberation Day, the end of Zerstorung.